Comment: Russia is chipping away at the European security architecture

Comment Ukraine negotiations Russia is sawing away at the European security architecture As of: November 11, 2026 • 4:14 p.m

The negotiations in Abu Dhabi are not just about Ukraine, says Stephan Laack. Russia's demands were also aimed at the European security architecture. That's why all alarm bells should be ringing.

If you take a closer look at the Russian side's final declaration from Abu Dhabi, abysses open up. The head of the Russian delegation, Vladimir Medinsky, is not only questioning individual elements of the European security architecture - probably on behalf of his master in the Kremlin. He calls for their fundamental reorganization. It's not about individual components, but about the entire system. This refers to the order that ensured peace, stability and security in Europe for decades after the Second World War.

A representative of Vladimir Putin - the man who, for the first time since the end of the Second World War, launched a large-scale war of aggression against a European neighbor that violated international law, occupied and annexed a fifth of its national territory - is now talking about the failure of the European security system.

What is even more remarkable is how Russia imagines this new order. The states that have allegedly failed and would be directly affected by such a transformation should not play a role. Medinski accuses them of acting irresponsibly and of being complicit in the deaths in Ukraine. What's more: the Europeans have deceived the Ukrainian people and are therefore actually jointly responsible for civilian casualties.

As if the Europeans were responsible for bombing homes, hospitals and shelters. As if they were responsible for the documented attacks on civilians by FPV drones. This perpetrator-victim reversal is more than just propaganda. It serves to morally justify a war of aggression and to delegitimize all those states that support Ukraine.

Medinski even goes one step further. He refers to the Yalta and Potsdam conferences at which the USA, Great Britain and the Soviet Union negotiated Europe's post-war political order in 1945. The reference is by no means accidental. Because it brings back memories of a time when great powers decided the fate of other states. There is one thing that Russia is certainly no longer a great power. It is a huge empire that cannot even beat the comparatively small Ukraine. But Russian inferiority complexes and self-overestimations are a different topic.

According to the Russian narrative, not only Ukraine but a significant part of Europe is now affected by alleged “Nazism”. This is precisely why Medinski's call for a new European order must be alarming. Behind this is the idea that the world is shaped by a few major powers and that the interests of smaller states are secondary. Medinski explained what this actually means. Any "scrap of Russian territory" will sooner or later return to Russia, he said.

President Putin has repeatedly claimed that Ukraine is historically Russian land. But the question also applies to other former Soviet republics, especially to states with Russian-speaking minorities. Added to this are the recurring demands from Moscow that NATO must retreat to 1997 levels. Those countries that would be affected would be those in Central and Eastern Europe that consciously sought the protection of the Western alliance after the end of the Cold War.

From this perspective it becomes clear what Moscow thinks of the sovereignty of European states: nothing at all.

This topic in the program: tagesschau.de | Moscow wants to negotiate Europe's future | 11/11/2026 | 3:50 p.m